Good point on France
Emmanuel Goldstein writes: "[This] has a big lesson for the liberal minded pro-Europeans (most pro-Europeans tend to fall into that category). If Britain is to embed every important governmental function within Brussels, what’s to stop the machinery falling into the wrong hands? Precious little.

Austria (junior coalition partner), Italy (two junior coalition partners) and now France – that’s a pretty bad track record for Far Right breakthroughs. I know that none of these guys could be judged to be down the line fascists, especially in Austria, but these are not marginal countries but in at least two cases are more in the heart of Europe than we are.

This may very well be a high watermark for the European right – for in the EU where are extreme nationalists going to make more gains. Belgium, the Netherlands and Ireland are the only three countries where extreme nationalists have the electoral machinery necessary for a breakthrough – and none of these countries is particularly large.

However, this may be the high water mark for this particular tide, ten or fifteen years hence there may be another tide like this. What can we do then? Nothing if we’re in Europe."

The argument usually goes that the EU stems the rise of "far right nationalism", or fascism. I agree with self-confessed reactionary E. Goldstein: the EU fosters this sort of nationalist baclash, and with the left being either antinational or weak (or both...) the swing goes towards parties like FN or Fremskrittspartiet here in Norway.